In 2005, Brian “Head” Welch, guitarist and original member of Korn, walked away from it all.

The quintet from Bakersfield rose to prominence once it relocated to Huntington Beach soon after forming in 1993, garnering great success with the nü-metal explosion of the late ’90s and topping the rock charts with cuts such as “No Place to Hide,” “A.D.I.D.A.S.” and “Got the Life.”

Since then they have scored seven Grammy nominations and two wins, for best short form music video (“Freak on a Leash,” 2000) and best metal performance (“Here to Stay,” 2003), as well as accolades from MTV, Revolver magazine and more – all while becoming a festival mainstay and touring relentlessly alongside Deftones, Ozzy Osbourne, Slipknot, Limp Bizkit and others.

Yet, despite how fun it was to be on top, Welch contends his exit was necessary due to his ongoing struggle with methamphetamine and his desire to get clean. That meant leaving his band of brothers: vocalist Jonathan Davis, bassist Reggie “Fieldy” Arvizu, guitarist James “Munky” Shaffer and former drummer David Silveria. But Welch, now sober and a born-again Christian, had other priorities, specifically his then-5-year-old daughter, Jeanne.

“When I walked away, I didn’t care about any of it,” he said during a recent phone interview at a tour stop in Toronto. “I just wanted to raise my daughter right and get my life together. I also wanted to see how real this God stuff was. I raised my daughter – I’d take her to school and I tried to become just a normal dude.”

Fitting in proved to be difficult, he adds, as his dreadlocks and tattooed arms often caused other parents to call the principal of his daughter’s school to report “some weird freak” hanging out in the parking lot. “The principal would say, ‘That’s just Brian and he’s a sweetheart,’” he recalls with a laugh.

It was his daughter that initially led him out of Korn, but last year it was also she who helped him back in. Now a teenager, Jeanne persuaded her dad to take her to see Korn live. He hesitatingly agreed, but after reconnecting with his old mates, he ended up joining them on stage for the first time in seven years during the song “Blind.”

“A week later, I got the call,” Welch says of being invited back into the group. “The managers had been asking me over the years to come back and I had said no, because that was about business. When it became more about friendship, it was like, ‘OK, this is supposed to happen.’ Now that I’m back, it’s like a gift I wasn’t even looking for, because I was already done.”

With Welch back in the mix, the band headed into Buck Owens Studios in Bakersfield to begin work on its 11th studio album, The Paradigm Shift, which drops Tuesday. Welch isn’t the only member of Korn to free himself from demons: he shares that the entire band is now living clean and that this release marks the first time the group recorded with clear heads.

“The chemistry came back right away,” he says. “It was just there and it kept building that whole first week. It was almost perfect. It was just friends having fun.

“We were just jacked before. That’s what drugs do. At first it was cool – you’re all wacked out and writing songs, and you’re like ‘oh cool, trippy.’ And the next thing you know, the drugs are stealing your creativity, your mind, your emotions – and then you’re in the gutter. Luckily for us, we were given a second chance.”

The band is currently playing a series of album-launch gigs, which kicked off Sept. 26 in Philadelphia and stops at the Wiltern in Los Angeles for a sold-out show on Thursday before closing out in Las Vegas on Oct. 12. Welch says the new material, which has received a positive response from fans, is fitting well within the set. The fresh cuts, he says, sound a lot like “old Korn.”

“We’re still just as crazy as we were before,” he says. “The funny thing is that people would think we were drunk now because of the way we act all of the time.”

He admits that there were occasions in the past when the band couldn’t wait to be done performing so they could go directly to the after-party. Now that they are sober and their focus has shifted toward family, the show has become more of a priority. “We all came into it this time with clear minds. We’re all feeling the new music – that’s our new high, now that we’ve gotten our lives together.”

With the album’s release just days away, Welch says they’re excited to share it with fans. He also notes how working with producer Don Gilmore, who previously helmed records by Linkin Park, Hollywood Undead and Lacuna Coil, was “a perfect choice.”

“He knew how to get the job done and it worked out really well,” he continues. “He worked on Pearl Jam’s Ten (as an engineer) and produced Linkin Park’s Hybrid Theory so we knew that he knew his stuff. There was a level of respect there that was pretty high.”

Welch says Korn still has a lot of love for Orange County, although Arvizu is the only member still residing in the area. Welch has lived in Nashville since 2001, when he sold his three-story home just off Pacific Coast Highway.

“I still love going to Huntington and seeing all of my friends,” he says. “I love going down to my friend’s place, Sancho’s Tacos. It’s like a happening spot down there. I just don’t go down there to party anymore.”

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